Haridwar, January 12
“We welcome all pilgrims and people from across the country and world to take holy bath in the holy Ganga in Haridwar on the occasion of the Maha Kumbh on behalf of people of Uttarakhand,” said Chief Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank while launching various projects, specially constructed for the Maha Kumbh today.

Terming it as a matter of pride and prestige for not only the state but also for the entire country, the Uttarakhand Chief Minister welcomed the people and devotees to come and take the holy dip in the Ganga river.

Stating that the state government, through the mela administration, is fully prepared to provide the best of facilities to the pilgrims and tourists during the four-month tenure of the fair, Nishank elaborated the mela budget and the projects being carried out specially for the Kumbh, which is first for Uttarakhand state after it came into existence.

Highlighting the state government’s seriousness towards the Kumbh mela preparations, Nishank compared the present budget and projects with those of previous Kumbh and Ardh Kumbh’s held in erstwhile Uttar Pradesh before the creation of Uttaranchal.

“This is the first time in the Kumbh history that on such a magnitude and large scale Kumbh works are being carried out. And we are a new state yet our working and canvas exceeds manifold when compared to other Kumbhs held in Allahabad, Ujjain, Nashik and in Haridwar earlier.

Highlighting the Kumbh works, the Chief Minister said 45.92 km of water pipeline had been laid besides eight tube wells, 110 km temporary water pipe lines, 99 km temporary distribution line network, 1,655 temporary stand post and 260 temporary fire hydrants. For providing pilgrims facility to bath, 4.75 km length of permanent ghats had been made at a cost of Rs 23.85 crore besides 2.2 km temporary ghats. A network of new roads spanning 15.54 km had been set up besides opening a hilly bypass that was unused for the past decade. In the interior roads of the city spanning 73.50 km, recarpeting had been done.

With Ganga getting polluted day by day, the Ganga Pollution Control Board has laid 33.97 km sewer line besides constructing two units of STP and purchasing 12 units of sewer-cleaning machines.

Till date, for various departmental works being carried out for the Maha Kumbh about Rs 545.90 crore has been spent on 284 works. A sum of Rs 408.50 crore had been released and nodal departments had spent Rs 408.50 crore of it. 

Haridwar, January 12
With the Maha Kumbh being a worldwide event, a state-of-the-art media centre, equipped with all facilities needed for both print and electronic media, has been set up for the ongoing Maha Kumbh in Haridwar.

The 24-hour press campus-media centre has been set up in the Neel Dhara area. Having a specific media centre for this Maha Kumbh is the vision of Chief Minister Ramesh Pokhriyal Nishank, who just after assuming the post of state head, had visioned a hi-tech media centre for covering the Kumbh.

With the Chief Minister being a journalist himself, his concern for providing media personnel coming from across the nation and world with the best facilities is seen in the setup at the media centre at a first glance itself.

As many as 100 computer sets have been placed in a large computer hall for mediapersons from where reporters and photographers can send their news and photos to their respective news offices. These computers are aided with 10 scanners, facsimile machines, printers and photo copier machines each.

A fully equipped soundproof studio has also been set up at the centre, specifically for local channels having recording and up-linking facility for first time. This studio is aided by five editing machines so that local channels can edit their coverage at the media centre itself.

Apart from relying on local, national and international media for the Kumbh coverage, the mela administration has set up its own media coverage team numbering five. The footages and programmes of these five teams will be available on media centre servers for electronic channels.

And after covering the hectic Kumbh events, the media personnel can also take rest at the media lounge and fill their stomach too at the cafeteria, which is the only facility that comes with a price tag!. The media centre will be aided by a technical staff available round the clock that makes this media centre quite different from others.

For media briefings and other events a multi-purpose seminar hall has also been put up, which can cater to hundreds of media personnel at a time. 

Dehradun, January 12
With a day to go for the first auspicious bath of the Maha Kumbh, the state forest authorities today went on a monkey-catching drive in Haridwar. They trapped over 40 monkeys in the Mansa Devi area in the very first two hours of the drive that was carried out to ward off any possible monkey attacks on pilgrims.

The Kumbh mela region has large tracts of forest areas in its vicinity, thus the authorities are making all possible last-minute preparations to keep incidents of possible man-wildlife conflict to a minimum.

Taking the challenge of monkey menace as the top priority, the authorities today pressed monkey trappers into service. They caught nearly 100 monkeys in the Mansa Devi area.

The monkey menace in Haridwar, particularly in the Mansa Devi area, had turned worse in the recent times with monkeys attacks on pilgrims becoming a regular feature on the temple track. The forest authorities had been fearing rise in the attacks during the Kumbh and had been planning for the remedial action.

Nodal officer for the mela and chief conservator of forest, Garhwal, DVS Khati, who has been camping in Haridwar to oversee the forest department’s preparations for the Kumbh, visited the Mansa Devi area and supervised the proceedings.

On pachyderm front, an elephant immobilisation training programme is already under way with the expert guidance by the Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun. This training assumes much significance as Haridwar and Rishikesh have been prone to elephant attacks and there was a bigger possibility of visitors getting into conflict with the animals. “Under such circumstances, it was all the more important for the forest staff to have preparedness for prompt immobilisation of the elephants to check any loss of life,” Khati pointed out.

Rajaji Forest officials have also been asked to remain vigilant during the Kumbh. While ensuring all measures to keep wildlife away from any conflict with the pilgrims, the officials have also to ensure that none resort to any mischief and poaching is kept fully unchecked.

It will certainly be a mammoth task to save both wildlife and pilgrims in one of the biggest religious congregation in Haridwar for the past many years. Evidently signalling a challenge, a leopard had died on the Dehradun-Rishikesh road few days ago after being hit by a speeding vehicle. With a significant rise in the volume of traffic, more wildlife casualties cannot be ruled out in future. Uttarakhand WWF coordinator AK Singh admits that for the state forest authorities, it is certainly a daunting task to protect wildlife even when there is so much human activity in its close proximity.

However, the authorities are hopeful of a peaceful Kumbh while claiming to be fully prepared for any eventuality. 

Nainital, January 12
The police is yet to make a headway in the case pertaining to a daylight robbery at Bazpur that stunned the township on yesterday.

According to the information, six armed robbers entered a jewellery shop in the afternoon and decamped with gold and jewellery worth more than Rs 50 lakh.

Interestingly, the shop in which the robbery took place is located a few hundred metres from a police station. Angry residents and shopkeepers shut down the market and resorted to slogan shouting against the police.

The armed robbers, after entering the shop in the Inter College market area, had locked the two owners Vinay Garg and Aman Garg, along with an employee and a craftsman, in a cabin of the shop. They had broken the mobile phone of one of the owners and had hit Vinay Garg on the head with the pistol when he opposed their move.

They snatched two gold chains worn by the owner and also snatched a gold chain of a customer who was present in the shop while the heist was on.

Thereafter, they had collected about 3 kg of gold and other jewellery and coolly drove away in a car bearing the registration number of Punjab.

It was only when the locked up persons managed to come out of the cabin that the people came to know what had happened.

The employees of the shop said the robbers had come in two batches in the guise of prospective customers. The episode has left the people of the township feeling insecure and stunned. 

Dehradun, January 12
The police has claimed to have identified three miscreants who had beaten up and robbed two forest officials of Rs 4.88 lakh on January 1 at Zudali village in Vikas Nagar and is in the process of arresting them very soon.

The officials were carrying Rs 4,88,635, which was the royalty money from Kulhal situated forest barrier to deposit in the Timli range office. But sadly the duo, Darogha Rupchand Ramola and daily wager Dalbir Singh Negi, landed in a trouble near Zudali village, as three persons riding on a bike fired a shot with a country-made pistol at the officials’ bike resulting which the latter lost control to fell on the road.

The three miscreants instantly pounced on them and hit them with the weapon and snatched the bag containing the amount. Both the officials were later admitted to CHC, Vikasnagar.

Speaking to The Tribune, Vikas Nagar Circle Officer (CO) GR Bijalwan said, “We have already identified the criminals and would very soon arrest them. We have formed five teams, including the Special Operation Group, to arrest the trio. The teams had been sent to other states particularly Uttar Pradesh in this connection.”

The police is raiding the hideouts and suspected places, where the trio could be hiding. The criminals are clever. They flee the hiding spot before the police’s arrival, said the CO.

He also informed that it was not an easy job for the police to identify and trace them, as the forest officials couldn’t read the number of the robbers’ vehicle.

And it was a sheer negligence of the officials as they were carrying such a big amount without any security guard. 

Dehradun, January 12
Another tiger causality took place in the Corbett National Park on Monday. This time a carcass of a six-year-old tiger was found in the Dikhala zone of the Corbett. This had added up to fourth deaths of tiger in the Corbett in the past 24 days.

Corbett Director R Mishra, however, attributed the latest death to a natural one. He ruled out involvement of poachers in the incident asserting that the organs of the tiger were found to be intact.

A few days back, the body of a three-year-old male tiger was found in Phulai Chod in the Dhikala region of the Corbett National Park. The Corbett authorities had citied it as due to internal struggle.

Tiger deaths in the Corbett have been mostly due to territory struggle. There had been suggestions to increase the total area of the Corbett so as to ensure better expanse of forestland for the tigers.

Interestingly, Union Minister of Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh had a day back admitted that poaching had become an organised crime in case of tiger and had expressed fears of more of tiger poaching cases taking place in 2010, the year being dedicated to tiger in China. 

Roorkee, January 12
An Assistant Professor of the IIT, Roorkee, Dr R Balasubramanyam, was arrested on the charge of harassment of his wife for dowry here yesterday.

Dr Balasubramanyam’s wife S Jayashankri lodged a complaint with the Civil Lines police station.

In her complaint, Jayashankri alleged that her husband had been harassing her for dowry since their marriage took place in 2004. “He even beat me up many a time on the issue,” alleged Jayashankri, adding that her parents, too, intervened on many occasions to settle the things between the couple, but all in vain.

Dr Subramanyam, a resident of Tirunnavelli Town (Tamil Nadu), is Assistant Professor in the Department of Mathematics and stays at Neeti Nagar, here.

Civil Lines inspector DK Bhandari said Balasubramanyam has been arrested after registering a case under the IPC and the Dowry Act.

Pitthoragarh, January 12
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has replied positively to the demand of Uttarakhand for the inclusion of the state in the proposed Pancheswar authority to be constituted to construct the Pancheswar Dam, a joint venture of India and Nepal, coming up on the Kali river in the state. This was stated by Uttarakhand Planning Minister Prakash Pant while talking to this correspondent yesterday.

“In his reply to our letter written on December, 2008, about the inclusion of Uttarakhand in the Pancheswar authority, which includes officers of India and Nepal, the Prime Minister has replied on December 21 that he is looking into the matter and wants the interest of Uttarakhand should be protected in relation to this project,” said Pant.

Uttarakhand had put forward its demand for its inclusion in the authority as third party as most of the Indian parts likely to be submerged in the dam waters belong to Uttarakhand. The state has said if the proposed dam comes into existence, its 120 villages and hundreds of hectares of forest land will submerge in dam waters and the state will have to take the responsibility of rehabilitating the displaced people.

Dehradun, January 12
Employees of the Uttaranchal Federation of Ministerial Services Association went on an indefinite strike to press the state government for the fulfilment of their demands here today.

The protesters also staged a dharna on Gandhi Road yesterday. They raised slogans against the apathy of the government for implementing a hike in their salaries.

The notification given to the state government had demands from different departments of the ministerial board. In their alarming memorandum, the protesters have clearly mentioned to provide them with a hike in salary as per the Sixth Pay Commission, regularisation of the ministerial employees, promotion orders of the awaiting members and setting up a structure of the ministerial workforce.

Other demands precisely consisting of providing special compensatory (remote areas) allowance and transport allowance to the employees of the adjoining districts of the state. RTO, irrigation, health, PWD, education, ayurvedic and unani, children development, social welfare, collectorate, trade and industries, horticulture and many other departments are closed for the indefinite time.

Apparently, the authority concerned paid no heed to the plea of the protesters, in result to which the offices of more than 15 departments were locked today till the protesters receive the government orders in their hands.

Roorkee, January 12
The Municipal Board’s helpline, which had been started three months ago to address the problems of residents, is still to gain popularity.

Only two-three complaints are received daily through the helpline number, said an official of the board.

“Apart from the complaints regarding minor civic problems like water-logging in residential areas or uncleanliness, mostly the people make queries about power cuts from us,” said Rohit Kumar, caretaker of the helpline.

The helpline was started with the association of a local NGO, Jaago Roorkee Jaago. “The aim was to address the problems (civic) of local residents without bothering them. The localites have to make several rounds of the government offices for their minor complaints. To provide them relief, we started the helpline in collaboration with the local Municipal Board,” said a member of the NGO.

Now, anyone can call at the helpline (9568000777) for the redressal of his complaints regarding non-functional streetlights, blocked sewerage, insanitary conditions, animal menace and other public nuisances, added Rohit Kumar.

“This is our first attempt to provide services on a phone call. On getting a complaint, we send our staff along with the members of the NGO. Several more facilities will be provided to the residents of Roorkee,” said Pradeep Batra, Chairman of the board. 

Dehradun, January 12
Chevrolet Sales India Private Limited today launched its new generation small car Beat here at DPM Auto Sales in Dehradun.

On the occasion, IGP RS Meena was the chief guest, who unveiled the car. MD of DPM Gaurisuri said Beat was a small car and the company had made it keeping in view the Indian youth and the middle class.

The design and the style of the car has made it special and the car gives the feeling of being young. The features of this car include 1.2 litre petrol engine, 18.6 km mileage, three years or one lakh km warranty, dual airbag, tubeless tyres, automatic climate control air-conditioner and easy adjustable steering, the MD said.

The Chevrolet Beat comes in four varieties, including 1.2 base, 1.2 LS, 1.2 LT and 1.2 LT optional.